SoulFrame, a Dark Souls like game mixed with warframe visuals, is a new free game being developed by Digital Extremes(DE) since mid 2022.
As the game approaches a release-worthy state, DE has been allowing more and more people to try and, and I was one of the lucky ones in this last batch! So I decided that, since it’s no longer NDA-bound, why not record some gameplay and share my thoughts on this new title?
A Strange World
The moment you log-in, you’re greeted with an awesome song and poetry, that you help make by picking your mom’s physical characteristics as the narrator describes her. The world has a medieval theme. Your parents seem to live on a castle and, right as an army of strange creatures are invading, your mom sends you away to safety on a basket, delivered by an unknown stranger and the screen fades out, but not before we see the baby’s arm, and how rock-like it looks.
When the screen fades in again, you’re greeted by a faceless entity, that knocks you unconcious, and your character appears dead on a river. A moose-looking animal commands a sparrow to bring you back to life and there your adventure starts.
Yes, it sounds like an accid trip.
Gameplay
The gameplay is awesome. There is no stamina system, so you are free to attack, doge, run and jump as much as you like, but otherwise the movement is fairly similar to most souls-like games: Parry, dodge roll, magic, weapons, armor, perks, etc.
One interesting aspect is, you can access this “other world” called Nightfold, a small safe area where you can level up, customize stuff, etc at any point. Sometimes when you help in-game NPCs they may also join in that place.
The world is open, with a seemingly giant map, villages, towers, camps and many characters you can talk to or interact with. There are chests and breakable objects everywhere.
Graphics and Story
The story if full of poetry, with parts of it feeling like its a book. What I said in the first section(A Strange World) is about half what I played so far, the other half being exploration, talking to the first ghost-like NPC and a… turtle? near the end of the video, but its captivating. There’s a whole lot not explained beforehand and thats nice, because it lets you actually play the game before deciding whether or not you care about it and its story.
Graphically, its very pretty. Nothing cutting-edge and no raytracing as far as I could find, and the visuals are very similar to Warframe, DE’s biggest success, but thats not to say they lack anything. The colors are vibrant, the style unique, and the world is full of things to see.
Is it worth it?
Short answer: yes.
Long answer: Still yes. The game is free, not heavy at all(consuming even less resources than warframe), has beautiful graphics and, so far, seems to have a very interesting story to uncover as you play.
For lovers of RPGs and grinding games, there are a few classes and perks you can pick/level up, multiple armors, weapons, weapon types, magic, etc so the gameplay style can fit a wide variety of tastes.
For Dark Souls fans, the game is definitely easier gameplay-wise, but very similar in nature. Maybe a touch less grimdark.
Overall, a very promising game and definitely worth a shot!
